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September 9, 2007

G144: Red Sox 3, Orioles 2

Beckett (7-7-2-0-8, 116) lowered his ERA to 3.27. He allowed two solo home runs. Jemmer and The Bot finished up.

For those who care about such things, Beckett received credit for his 18th win (18-6). (Please keep in mind that in his absolutely shitty 2006 season, Beckett led the Red Sox with 16 victories.) Chien-Ming Wang of the Yankees won today in Kansas City and is also 18-6.

With the score tied 2-2 in the eighth, JD Drew lead off with a single. Youkilis lined out to second. With Jason Varitek batting, Drew stole second and went to third as Tek flew to center. Coco Crisp singled Drew home with the go-ahead run.

Boston got their other runs in the third. With two outs, Dustin Pedroia singled and David Ortiz doubled. Mike Lowell then singled them both in.

Pedro had a chance to strike out 4 in the 3rd inning. He K'd Biggio but the ball bounced at home plate and went to the backstop and Biggio reached. He struck out the next two guys, then gave up a single to Mark Loretta. Mike Lamb then flew out to center to end the inning. That would have been awesome to see Pedro strike out four in an inning.

This date in 78 was a Saturday and the Sox lost their third straight game as D. Eckersley lost to R. Guidry 7-0. The 10th of Sept. would bring new meaning to the words boston massacre and introduce RSN to Bobby Sprowl.

In 2004 T. Wakefield lost to the Seattle Mariners 7-1. Wildcard lead would remain at 3.5 games.

Pedro's next AB, he grounded one to short, but Loretta, filling in for the injured Adam Everett, bobbled it and the throw to first - not in time. Pedro legged it out. Reyes quickly grounded out to short with the bases loaded to end the inning. 2-0 Mets still.

The Red Sox this year have kept the best record in all of baseball for almost the entire season, no major slumps. '78 Sox--huge slump, blowing a big lead. But if you're gonna bring it up, I want lots of updates in that final week when the '78 team had its amazing comeback that no one talks about.

But if you're gonna bring it up, I want lots of updates in that final week when the '78 team had its amazing comeback that no one talks about.

Already planned in fact if you look at that team they fell behind at least two but if I remember correctly it was 3 1/2 games, before they came back to force the tie! Was daily talk in the dorm that pennant race.

The two seasons are similar in lots of ways. A stud pitcher in their careers (Eck vs Josh), an old pitcher on the way out (Tiant vs Schilling), a consistent double digit pitcher (Torrez vs Wakefield), and a young closer (Stanley vs Papelbon).

Both teams got off to big lead over the Yankees and both teams record have been close all year as in best record since 1978 etc.

Is there any impact on the 2007 team from that team? Not really, unless you want to count the fact that Remy and Eck have brought up that season as a reason for this team not to let up numerous times this year. I also don't remember me saying that this team is going to blow this lead. I think I have been pretty positive all year about this team (except for last night when I basically said I don't want to see Daisuke the rest of the season).

I also remember that season for other reasons, mainly that fall semester being my first exposure to obnoxious Yankee fans (guy across the hall), the end of my baseball career (was the last summer I played semi-pro), and other shared memories with my father. Even though that season ended watching Yaz pop up as I skipped classes to watch the game it was still a special season in a lot of ways for me.

Yeah, I'm totally down with Sox history and stuff but in this case, and like you say, obviously this isn't why you're doing it, but to be in a season where we had a 14 game lead and now it's closer, and it's September, I just don't want to hear about 1978. But it's your call.

Magic # to make playoffs is 10. Here's why I hate the wild card: Let's say the Yanks clinch the WC before we clinch the division. At that point, we'll both be in the playoffs. So the moment we clinch the division becomes unexciting. I miss the old division races.

I love watching the pitchers hit, and I hate knowing that hitting isn't a big part of a national league pitcher's game. It's understandable for an AL pitcher to be a bad hitter in interleague play and the World Series, but an NL pitcher? Come on. Put some more effort and time into the hitting because that's a valuable spot in the batting order you're taking up.

ish said... It's understandable for an AL pitcher to be a bad hitter in interleague play and the World Series, but an NL pitcher? Come on.

Guys who hit every fifth day are not good hitters pitchers or not...Mirabelli, Cora, Hinske, Pena...These guys all circle around 250 and lower all year.to be a good hitter takes alot of time and alot of ab's.....to expect a pitcher to do it ,in today's game, is laughable....and too actually want to see it, that's painful..

Then laugh at me, but I love seeing pitchers come up with big hits. You're right, though. They get so little at-bats, both in the Majors and the minors (AA and AAA pitchers hit only when both teams in a game are NL affiliates) that even the best hitting pitchers are going to be below-average. But my point was that if you're pitching in the National League, you know you're going to have to bat.

But this is 2007 and teams aren't paying their pitchers large contracts to hit. I guess if you're a better hitter than pitcher they'd move you to another position, but it's a spot in the lineup that can come around in some pretty important situations. Sure, late in the game you pinch hit, but some of the best scoring opportunities come early in the game.

What would you think if teams actually did put more emphasis on hitting with their pitchers? What if it paid off? I think being able to increase the batting average of the NL pitchers, even by as little ten or twenty points, can be more beneficial to a team than you'd think. With 2 outs and men on, you're at the plate with a .105 batting average and you know your at-bat is just a formality. As a pitcher in that situation all you need to do is reach base so the top of the order can come up: work a walk, dunk one just behind the infield, find a hole, etc.

We could go on and on and on about this, but I don't think it's painful to at least try to take away the "automatic out" status from a pitcher.